PLC in Social Cause Diet (Book)
August 10, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Author Gail Perry Johnston is concerned that in our country, where hundreds and hundreds of diet books are produce each year, we continue to grow increasingly gluttonous. Her contention is that most diet books have one major flaw: they are still all about food and the dieter.
This book is about as far away from that M.O. as is imaginable. Her new book, The Social Cause Diet, is all about getting the attention off ourselves and onto to helping others. She maintains that “volunteering is good for your health.” On the menu is an entry by PLC’s very own Cody Fisher.
Check out The Social Cause Diet on Amazon - or just visit our Preemptive Love page to see how you can volunteer with PLC and improve your health!
Website Down/Up/Down
August 6, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Some of you may have noticed that our website has been experiencing growing pains over the last couple of weeks.
We had a crash a few weeks ago which required gutting some of the code and working it back in one piece at a time. In the recoding process somehow I failed to get the header back in there. It was an easy enough fix, except for the fact that our ISP in Iraq has a ridiculous caching policy and I was unable to pull down our website from the Internet proper for a few days… I was only able to call down a lot of cached content from the ISP.
BOTTOM LINE: I couldn’t see that the banners weren’t loading in America and the rest of the world because they were loading just fine for me here in Iraq. Finally, I was able to secure professional help.
Things seem to be mostly fixed now… but as we grow there are bound to be some other glitches along the way. Thanks for sticking with us as we grow up here in Iraq.
Be sure to check out Kids Klash - our major growing pain that started all this mess in the first place!
The Fabulous CD Release Show
August 6, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Some of our good supporters and friends in Michigan have just finished up an incredible second album called “No Paradise.” If you’re in the area, you should go check them out at their CD release show August 22nd in MUSKEGON, MI. Find out more on their MySpace page (below).
1st Day at the Hospital- Hevi and Shkar
July 23, 2008 by bobby · Leave a Comment
12 year old Hevi and 6 year old Shkar have arrived safely in Israel and are undergoing the initial tests and preparations for their heart surgeries. These kids and their parents have been through a lot in just a few days: leaving their families in Iraq, travelling all the way to Israel, adjusting to a very foreign place and then undergoing lots of medical tests. This is has been a long process for many just to get to this point. There is a mixed sense of relief and yet apprehension to finally be at the hospital and be one step closer to the actual heart surgery. And yet Hevi and Shkar both had smiles to show after their blood tests, injections and echocardiograms. These kids are so resilient! What a privilege for us to be part of this journey with them.
Cody’s Going Away Podcast
July 19, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Unfortunately, we just lost Cody back to America. Cody is now the U.S. Director for PLC and this is our last podcast together before he boarded the plane. In this podcast we talk about some of the partnerships with bands we’ve got going right now, the Preemptive Love Art Exhibition here in Iraq, and some other nuggets.
Enjoy! Push play below…
ToOpenYourEyes.com
July 17, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Some freelance friends of our have started their journal to Iraq in earnest to document our life and work here… check out toopenyoureyes.com for more information. And watch the video below…
Happy Birthday, BSSL! Meet PLC!
July 7, 2008 by Jeremy · 1 Comment
On July 7th, 2007 an amazing thing happened… a guy named Chad was the first of hundreds and hundreds of compassionate people to purchase the as-yet-unknown shoe called Klash. Chad and hundreds like him have given us the encouragement and confidence we’ve needed to keep selling Klash and using the proceeds to fund heart surgeries for Iraqi kids.
And as cliche as this is about to sound, lots of people thought we were crazy. Most thought it was a three week project that we would outgrow. Some thought it was a silly failure to comprehend the real needs of Iraqis. Indeed, at times we probably thought so ourselves. But as one month has turned to twelve, there is no denying the magnetic force behind the simplicity of our message.
The Preemptive Love Coalition, via the “Buy Shoes. Save Lives.” program, has now sent 13 kids to surgery, funding them at various stages along the way to the tune of $36,500. What a pretty tune! We raised and gave away an additional $16,000 for pre-op heart screenings and have money waiting for 6-7 kids that we plan on sending later this month.In 12 months we’ve invested nearly $22,000 into local klash-making economies, plus tens of thousands more into the broader economy as a by-product of operating our business. We’ve sold $33,000 of Klash across the US, UK, Europe, Africa and Australia, and have seen such a range of creativity exercised in helping these children that we sometimes just sit astounded at all you do!
One of the major developments of the past year is the way in which we’ve reorganized under the banner of The Preemptive Love Coalition. After 4 months of selling shoes to save lives we started realizing that we had more to say that “buy shoes. save lives.” We wanted to say “Love your enemies. Do good to those who do bad to you.” In a region where “tit for tat” is the predominant peacemaking method, we wanted to lead out with another option.
Our “this for that” model is as simple as encouraging those who would be with us to find something in their current environment and use it (”this”) in the service of the thousands and thousands of Iraqi who are waiting in a line for life-saving heart surgeries outside the country (”that”).”This for that” is also about giving back love for hate; kindness for oppression; truth for perceptions.
As we look forward to the coming year we envision moving deeper into the hurt of Iraq and working among the more oppressed and excluded groups of people. We want them to know that there is an entire movement of people in America and around the world who will not abide the ongoing retaliatory methods of “peacemaking” in the region. We are those who use all manner of “this” for that - for peace; for kindness; for truth.
We are The Preemptive Love Coalition. Thanks for being with us!
Jeremy, Cody, Michelle, Ruth, Scott, Bobby
Audrey, Angel, Chris, Colby, Jesse, Peter (THE INTERNS)
963 Coffee Saves Little Iraqi Lives!
July 6, 2008 by Jeremy · 2 Comments
Our friends over at 963 Coffee facilitate the fair trade of coffee so that you get your daily Joe and the farmers get their fair share of that $5 cup of caffeine. Instead of beans on the dollar, they get a fair working wage, good working conditions, the right to organize themselves into unions, and a host of other benefits not afforded by other coffee companies.
In addition to what is already a great product, 963 Coffee has set up an affiliate program through which all of your purchases made by linking from PLC will go into an account with the Preemptive Love Coalition name on it. So on top of everything else, buying coffee will now fund heart surgeries for Iraqi kids, too!
We get 40% of sales from the store through this affiliate program. If you buy 10 bags of coffee for your office at $10/each, children in Iraq will receive $40 of your purchase. If you are an addict, we recommend the Monthly Obsession (like a subscription to coffee!). It only takes 63 friends at 2 bags of coffee per month, that would be $6,000 to children in Iraq in one year alone! That’s an entire heart surgery funded strictly by drinking coffee!
So forgo your POPULAR COFFEE CHAIN and drink some 963 Coffee instead.
NOTE: The coffee in question here sells in 12 oz. packages.
Six PLC Interns Arrive in Iraq
July 3, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Wonder of wonders, six collegiate interns have just arrived in Iraq to work with all of us at The Preemptive Love Coalition this summer.
They have been an amazing, eager, sharp group of students and we are thrilled to see the ways in which they help us increase the success of the Buy Shoes. Save Lives. program as well as the infrastructural things we are addressing here in the country.
Plan on seeing more of the interns in coming days as they blog, vlog, podcast, and make much noise on Facebook, MySpace, etc. After all, that’s what college students do best.
Interested in a Winter 2008/09 Internship or the Summer 2009 Internship? Click here!
Official Wrapping Up at Zamwa Gallery
June 15, 2008 by Jeremy · Leave a Comment
Today marked the official wrap up of the Preemptive Love exhibition at Zamwa Gallery. We met with a representative from the US State Department, gave an update on our work, and spoke briefly about a few opportunities on the horizon for future networking together.
Many thanks from all of us at PLC (formerly BSSL) to the US State Department and their incredibly capable staff here in Iraq. We are very grateful to Rostam Aghala at Zamwa Gallery for his partnership on this project. Thanks also to the First Lady of Iraq, Hero Talabani, for her kind endorsement of the exhibition and the tour she gave to her foreign guests from the RAND Corporation while they were in country a few weeks ago.
If you haven’t bought a book of Kurdish art yet to fund heart surgeries for Iraqi children, you can do so here. You can also view all of the art in the gallery before buying right here.
Best,
The PLC
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